Wednesday, November 07, 2012

Static vs Dynamic Encumbrance

In working out the fatigue and encumbrance rules for Era I stumbled upon a limitation of the encumbrance mechanism. At one point the encumbrance of the equipment is left behind and the effect of a sword in round to round combat is represented as a plus or minus or a cap on dexterity bonuses. I was looking for something with less tables and less looking up. A value I can just add up to use the same mechanism I was already using for encumbrance.

So I came up with dynamic encumbrance and tactical builds. Dynamic encumbrance represents the load an item puts on the body when it is set in motion. A tactical build is the sum of all combat items set in motion during an attack. It might be simply a dagger or a sword, or armor, sword and shield. Each item has a dynamic encumbrance and all these add up the tactical build's dynamic encumbrance. This encumbrance can be added to the static encumbrance that is already defining base character encumbrance and through it determine the load on the character.

By using this I spare myself the trouble of having a set of extra tables to calculate bonuses and penalties based on weapon speed, dexterity and strength. Fitting it all into a single table that's much easier to maintain.